US CEO Pay Now More Than Before Recession

[MattShizzle]

http://www.star-telegram.com/2011/05/06/3057303/many-ceos-getting-paid-more-than.html




In the boardroom, it's as if the Great Recession never happened.
CEOs at the nation's largest companies were paid more last year than they were in 2007, when the economy was booming, the stock market set a record high and unemployment was roughly half what it is today.
The typical pay package for the head of a company in the Standard & Poor's 500 was $9 million in 2010, according to an analysis by The Associated Press using data provided by Equilar, an executive compensation research firm. That was 24 percent higher than a year earlier, reversing two years of declines.
Executives were showered with more pay of all types -- salaries, bonuses, stock, options and perks. The biggest gains came in cash bonuses: Two-thirds of executives got a bigger one than they had in 2009, some more than three times as big....

the average wage was less than one-half of 1 percent of the typical CEO's pay in the AP analysis made.


Meanwhile Unemployment is still high. This is disgusting.

[progressive_lefty]

They're just a bunch of pathetic individuals that obviously have no sense of reality or the wider world. It just shows how flawed capitalism is, capitalism is supposed to be about 'freedom' - but as we continually see its always about individual wealth and greed. Just imagine the world these CEOs think they live in, they think the world is basically perfect and that a lot of people just whinge.

[Le Socialiste]

They're just a bunch of pathetic individuals that obviously have no sense of reality or the wider world. It just shows how flawed capitalism is, capitalism is supposed to be about 'freedom' - but as we continually see its always about individual wealth and greed. Just imagine the world these CEOs think they live in, they think the world is basically perfect and that a lot of people just whinge.


I don't think capitalism has ever been about freedom. As far as I'm aware, its always been nothing more than a line the possessing-classes use to keep the people subservient. After all, who wants to go against "freedom"? The bourgeoisie have fed us this big lie, and for the most part we've taken it hook, line, and sinker. By crying foul every time the workers rebel, the rich have essentially turned the word on its head. Talk about doublespeak. :rolleyes:

[KC]

Meanwhile Unemployment is still high. This is disgusting.

CEO pay doesn't have much to do with unemployment. It's not like they'd take the extra money to hire more people if they paid their CEO less. I always think these arguments about CEO pay and bonuses are incredibly silly and completely superficial to the point where they skirt around the real issue. You can't describe crisis through CEO pay (or unemployment...). Just seems like something to whine about with no other real purpose.

[MattShizzle]

They could certainly use it to pay their regular employees a fair wage instead. Of course getting rid of capitalism altogether is the best solution, but still..